Daily Post

By the Book

ELEANOR RIGBY, by Douglas Coupland, Fourth Estate, pounds 15. 99 "AN original voice" is always handy if you want to write a good novel, but it isn't enough. You also need somebody to speak in it. For DouglasCoupland, this can be limiting: he writes some of the sharpest, most distinctive dialogue around; his way with an aphorism is almost as recognisable; but they both seem tuned for a narrower, more satirical range than he's interested in covering. Liz Dunn, the Eleanor Rigby of Eleanor Rigby...

She's Behind You ; Ian Parri Talks to Former Daily Post Journalist John Sergeant About the Highs and Lows of a High-Profile Newsman's Life

HE might have the look of a scolded pup about him, but John Sergeant can be a hard man when it comes to journalism. He's reported from war zones around the world, and has nailed down some eel-like politicians with questions they'd rather evade. But it was a famous incident with Margaret Thatcher still referred to as his "handbagging" that made this former political correspondent a household name.

They Do Make Music Like It Used to Be

HE next time some corduroy-trousered loudmouth starts moaning about how these new bands don't make music like they did in the 1960s, remember this article and quote it at them. As the Campaign for Real Music types jabber on about the imminent death of British rock and roll, citing its demise due to the twin demons of dance music and computers, a phalanx of young bands are reclaiming the crown.

Everybody's Favourite Jester ; the Annoying Thing About Jeremy Beadle Is That He Really Is Game for a Laugh. Philip Key Reports

PROFESSIONAL prankster Jeremy Beadle spent around 20 years playing practical jokes on the public in television shows like Game For a Laugh and Beadle's About. For those who would have liked to have seen the tables turned on the cackling jokester, the good news is that they have been. Several times.

7 Days: The Week's Highlights

AMERICAN-BORN, British-domiciled conductor Carl Davis opens the first of a new Royal Liverpool Philharmonic series, Chill at the Phil. His concert Chill Out Classics is aimed at allowing its audience to unwind and relax before the weekend. Items include Elgar's Nimrod from the Enigma Variations, Tchaikovsky's Waltz from Serenedae for Strings and the Desert Island Discs signature tune By a Sleepy Lagoon by Eric Coates.

Dvd View

Great Crimes and Trials Series One (15) FORREST Gump once said that life is like a box of chocolates. This four DVD box set shows that death can often encompass the same metaphor. It features 26 of the most shocking and ingenious crimes of the past 100 years each individually accessed at the press of a button making the grim subject matter accessible without ever sensationalising it or making it appear glib. Tight script stretching to just 25 minutes max per episode and matter of fact deliver...

The Big Picture: Rather Silly but Exhilarating ; Resident Evil: Apocalypse (15) Stars Mill a Jovovich, Sienna Guillory, Oded Fehr, Thomas Kretschmann and Jared Harris; Director Alexander Witt. 93 Mins. Rating . . .

THE most violence I ever encountered as a youngster in a board game was when I got knocked off in Ludo and had to return to my home square. Today's generation of video games are a different matter. In these it's mostly murder, mayhem, big guns, death and destruction. So you won't have a quiet time in any film based on a video game.

Film: Showing

BUBBA Ho-Tep has not only the oddest title of the year but has the craziest plot. Its premise is that Elvis Presley swapped places with an Elvis impersonator in order to escape show business pressures but ended up in an old folks home after injuring his hip.

Film: On

Bride and Prejudice (12a) . . . JANE Austen's Pride and Prejudice gets an Indian make over in this modern Bollywood version of the tale, complete with dance routines. Director/ writer Gurinder Chadha manages to keep the elements of Austen's story intact while throwing in some extra comic moments. Saw(18) . . . GRIM but cleverly-scripted thriller about a serial killer named Jigsaw who has a nasty way with his victims. In the opening sequence, two men awake to find themselves chained in a bathr...

Review: Pete Wylie and the Mighty Wah!/ the Magnet, Hardman Street

HE'S still got a lot to say -- and boy, he can't half say it. Pete Wylie, one of the true Liverpool originals, was back on stage for his first proper gig in "three or four years" this week. Where's he been? "Watching Trisha and Countdown, " he confesses and "taking more therapy than Tony Soprano. " Whatever he's done, it certainly worked. Before a capacity crowd of 250 Wylie devotees -- many had travelled from around the country -- this, at times troubled, genius reminded us all why he's one ...

Cd Review

Beautiful South -- Livin' Thing Rating . . . GOLDDIGGAS, Headnodders & Pholk Songs is the new album from the Beautiful South, and will feature a collection of cover versions of songs dear to the band's heart sung in their uniquely familiar bleak but chirpy style.

Please Don't Desert Us ; Liverpool's Latest Staging of Aida Could Be the Treat of a Lifetime. Lew Baxter Reports

THE producer of the acclaimed Opera International is pleading with Liverpool opera lovers not to desert her exciting new version of Verdi's Aida, which she describes as the treat of a lifetime. Ellen Kent, whose company makes regular visits to the city, says she is very concerned that her usually large following in Liverpool has abandoned her traditional opera productions in favour of glitzy modern musicals and other opera companies.

Return to the Roots of Rock

THERE has been for some time a deathly silence from the world of hard rock, no greasy types slamming out slick solos from wailing Gibson Les Paul guitars. West Londoners Rooster are aiming to be the band that breaks this drought. With the chops of seasoned stadium rockers and the looks of male models, they look to be the favourites to take the mantle as Britain's biggest rock band. You can see what you think when they play the Bar Fly in Liverpool's Seel Street on Tuesday, October 19.

Box Office

SEAN 'P Diddy' Combs has been ordered to pay a whopping pounds 20, 000-a-month in child support to the mother of his first child, fashion stylist Mis a Brim. It was said last night to be the biggest monthly child support paid by anyone in the United States. The decision was announced by a family court judge who said he based the size of the payments on the rap mogul's annual earnings of more than pounds 30m. Combs must also pay another pounds 200, 000 in retroactive support and to settle his ...

A Cultural Celebration ; Mike Chapple Looks at the Excitement in Store During This Week's Black Screen Festival

LIVERPOOL'S week-long Black Screen International Film and Video festival starts today with the theme for this year celebrating 10 years of democracy in South Africa. One of the highlights will be Women In The Directors Chair, organised in collaboration with the Women's Independent Cinema House which is celebrating its 20th anniversary. It will take place at Blackburne House, Hope Street, throughout Saturday, October 16, when a celebrity panel of women who have made their name in film and TV w...

Patagonian Visions

SIR KYFFIN Williams is synonymous with Wales and its many and varied landscapes but fans old and new are in for a glimpse of the lesser known Kyffins -- still with a sense of Wales but not of this country. In late 1968 the artist travelled to Patagonia to record the people and countryside. He did this with a series of slides, some of which form part of the Gwladfa Kyffin/Kyffin in Patagonia exhibition which opens tomorrow at Bodelwyddan Castle, Abergele.

Interview: Journey Home Let a Paper Bird Take Wing ; a Hard-Working Musical Wanderer Hit the Ground Running On His Return Home. Alun Prichard Learns More

HIS band had broken up and he was fed up, so with little on the horizon Alun Tan Lan decided to cross it and see what lay beyond. He went to Ireland, fell in with a bunch of musicians and began on a path which would take him around the world before returning to his home with his own song to sing. "It was 97, my band Serain had finished and I was at a loose end so I decided, sod it, I'll go, " he explains, but all he can say about choosing Ireland as his first port of call was that he, "just h...

Curtain Call: The Finest Romance

ARGUABLY the best love story ever written will be on stage in Rhosllannerchrugog's Stiwt Theatre this month when the Welsh Language Touring Theatre Company -- Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru presents William Shakespeare's well known tragedy, Romeo and Juliet. The play, which famously portrays the ill-fated relationship and marriage of a young teenage couple who are members of two constantly feuding Italian families, will be performed on Tuesday, October 19 and Wednesday October 20.

Curtain Call: Mike Takes the Mike

MIKE Doyle, the award winning comic, West End star and BBC TV sensation brings what he promises to be his best ever show to The North Wales Theatre, Llandudno for one night only on Sunday, October 31. Direct from entertaining passengers on the QE2 and QM2, the flamboyant, larger than life Mike Doyle is back by popular demand as he brings you a night of music and belly aching laughter that will refresh parts.

Centrepiece: Eisteddfota - Spectacular Proclamation

T HE proclamation ceremony of next year's Powys Provincial Eisteddfod in Bala was quite a spectacular event, serving to throw light on the fact that the Penllyn area was part of the old Powys Fadog as long ago as the 13th century. The capacity audience in the main hall of Ysgol y Berwyn, where the planned open air event was held because of the inclement weather, were reminded by the Presiding Druid, Talog, that the Eisteddfod's history dates back to 1820, when an Eisteddfod was held in Wrexha...